Getting Lean. Personal trainer style.

Hi all,
Here we are on the 14th day ( I think ) and things are going along swimmingly. The hint of a six pack has started to develop nicely and people have also started to comment on the way I look. This is always a good thing, often others will see the changes before you do. When you get the comments, take them. Don't discount them, slight of hand style. The best way to keep your confidence is to praise yourself or allow others to praise you. At two weeks in, the thing about eating enough food is getting easier. Which brings me to todays subject. Cheat days or cheat meals?
Most of the serious get lean programs, mine included, ask you to have a cheat day or a cheat meal. So which one is preferable and why.? Well, for me, I prefer to have just a cheat meal. First lets look at why a cheat meal is important. The human body is VERY adaptive so after a while on any kind of eating plan it becomes use to what you are eating and looks for ways to become more efficient at processing the energy. An increase in efficiency equals a decrease in metabolism, which equals fat storage. In order to keep the body guessing, throw in a cheat meal a couple of times a week. I usually have my cheat meal after a day of eating mainly protein, but this isn't always required. I prefer to have a cheat that is not too loaded with sugar. I might have a burger and some chips or something like that.( Real Hamburger, not Macca's) The reason I have just a cheat meal and not a cheat day is because a whole day of eating " cheat style" can trigger the processed carb addiction and it can then be very hard to go back to eating well. If you are like me and you have a bit of a sweet tooth, stick with the cheat meal formula and don't swallow a whole bucket of ice cream as your cheat. Instead look for something that is only a little junky and only buy enough for one meal. Don't go for the one kilo family size chocolate, thinking that you will have a line or two and keep the rest for next cheat meal. The next cheat meal is likely to become the next ad break. Be smart, be prepared and be lean. Remember, like a good paint job, preparation is the key.
Daran

Hi Ho friends,
It is now about 10 days since I started on my "Getting Lean Personal Trainer Style" program and things are starting to change with my body, which is great. My pants are fitting better and I am beginning to see a shadow of a six pack again.
Isn't it funny that at this time of the year we are all so body concious. It is no coincidence that the marketing of all the wonderous solutions for weight loss start to appear on television. I very rarely get to watch television, which is a blessing, and when I did I counted three commercials for weight loss plans in one hour. There is Xndo and Tony Ferguson and now Biggest loser weight loss bars and shakes. All you need to do is replace 2 meals a day and wonder of wonders you lose weight. So what happens when you replace the two bars a day with two meals again, when you are starving?
One of the other big catches is plan being put around by the amway crowd. It is called healthpointe 2 and I believe it is as dangerous as all the others. This one actually gives you a personal "weight loss coach" that will guide you through the process to ensure you have success. It is one of the better plans however it has some major flaws as well. First of all, and this applies to all of the "get thin quick" formulas, none of them do anything to calculate your personal BMR, or how many calories you may consume during the day. None of them even ask about your lifestyle, whether you are active or sedentary, what you do for work, what kind of exercise you like, whether you have any injuries, family history etc etc. All these factors are vitally important and need to be addressed if your body transformation is to be long lasting. The other major flaw with healthpointe is that to become a coach all you need as far as qualifications go is to be an amway IBO and' preferably have done healthpointe yourself. I know this because I used to use the healthpointe system until I raised some areas of concern with the my "upline" an d they were ignored. Sure there are some trainers floating around in the organization, buy in large though, the majority of the "weight loss coaches" are un qualified in any aspect of the health industry.
Yes weight loss is the next trillion dollar industry, there is no benefit, I believe, to be had by rail roading people into schemes supported by unqualified people. Take your health seriously enough to take it someone who can give you long term answers, not some quick fix with eye on the dollar signs.
More soon
Daz.

Getting lean, personal trainer style,

Hi There
Today is Friday and it day 5 of my getting lean challenge.
I have missed a couple of post over the last few days because I have been busy and away from my desk a lot. The important thing though is that I have continued to stay mostly on track with the eating. This brings me to a few really relevant points. The first one is tenacity. Regardless of what you are doing, whether it be getting lean, getting fit, building a business or looking for a partner in life, you must stick to it to see results. I often have a chuckle when I hear about sports stars becoming overnight champions. The truth is that overnight success took years of preparation. That brings me to the next point. Be prepared. Even though I was away from my normal routine, and I have to eat a lot of food to keep this program going, by being prepared I was able to have enough food with me and ready to eat so that I wasn't tempted to pig out on chocolates and other sweet stuff. Something I have learn't many times in the past and have had reinforced this time around is if I eat enough during the day it is really easy to resist the temptation to eat junk food. Keep the proteins and healthy fats intake high and sugar becomes less of an ogre to resist. The last point I wish to make here is about being good to your self. You will notice in the open sentences I said I was on track most of the time. Yes, even I don't follow my pland religiously. The trick here is if you trip up and have a bit of a furfee, get back on track as soon as you can. Acknowledge that you slipped, look for the reason why and find a way to overcome it. That will change the perspective on the slip and make it a learning opportunity.
I have got to go and eat now so until next time, keep exercising hard and eating right.
Daran

Getting Lean. Personal trainer style. Day 2

Welcome to day 2 of the great getting lean for 2009. Day 1 went great. For training I did a kickboxing class in the afternoon.1 hour. I am struggling with eating enough food to get calories I need. When we did the calculations last night, it turns out I only ate about 3200 calories, so I fell short by about 800 cals. To try and over come this I increased my breakfast by adding extra grapes and some rock melon.
I have just finished a twenty minute kettlebell workout, which was a tabata style workout. It went as follows.
Two handed swing 20 seconds / walking 10 seconds.
8 sets
Kettlebell clean 20 seconds / walking 10 seconds
8 sets each arm.
This workout takes about 20 minutes and with a 24kg kettlebell it is a killer.
I have another one planned for later this arvo. It is a combo body weight/kettlebell. It will take about 40 minutes.
Right now I am gagging on tuna and brown rice and a grunt shake.
I will be posting photos on facebook as the time progresses. I plan to take one a week for the big comparo.
At this point in time it appears that preparation is the key to success in the stuff. All of the ingredients for the meals were prepped on Sunday night and stored in plastic containers, so throwing a meal together is simply a case of opening some lids and tossing stuff in a wok. Last night we grilled about a kilo of chicken breast and that did us for dinner last night and tonight.
Like I said I am struggling with eating all the food, though I can feel my metabolism starting up. I woke up absolutely starving this morning and my energy levels have already improved.
More tomorrow.
Daran

Getting Lean. Personal trainer style.

Well it's the new year and like most of us, I have been a little slack with the food, indulging a little too much. My body fat content has increased and I took a look in the mirror the other day to be shocked white. It wasn't helped by my friend who I hadn't seen for about 18 months saying to me, " wow you have let your self go " . So, after he was safely in the ambulance and on his way to casualty I decided to embark on my 2009 getting lean program. Truthfully though, there are a few things that have caused me to get a little pudgy over the past few months and, believe it or not, failing to eat enough is one of the big things. I calculated by BMR and discovered that I need over 2000 calories per day just to stay alive. With the help of a heart rate monitor I found out that an average 1 hour kickboxing class burns about 1000 calories. I do five of these a week. A grunt strength training session ( kettlebell, sandbag, ) burns about 450 calories. I do three of these a week. On a rough calculation this means I need about 3800 - 4000 per day to keep up with my energy output. After keeping a food journal it became painfully obvious that I was getting no-where near that. In fact most days I was consuming as little as 1600 calories. The result of this is that my body was in starvation mode, which means my metabolism was sluggish, my thyroid hormones were erratic and I was storing fat.
Today is the day that Begin my increasing food phase. For me this means 6 meals a day. Breakfast looked like this; ( 6am )
4 eggs
2 rye bread toast
4 tomatos
1 mushroom
3 fish oil caps
1 shot of barley grass.
I am just having my morning snack ( 9.48 ) 48 minutes late!!
1 can of tuna
1 protein ball
1 grunt shake.
The total calories so far is about 1200. Only another 2800 to go.
It's a good thing I like food
More soon
Daz.